29. Weariness and Refreshing (2)
Hymns: RHC 332 Moment by Moment, 43 God Is Still On the Throne; 394 Deeper and Deeper
Job 10:8-13
8Thine hands have made me and fashioned me together round about; yet thou dost destroy me. 9Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay; and wilt thou bring me into dust again? 10Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese? 11Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews. 12Thou hast granted me life and favour, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit. 13And these things hast thou hid in thine heart: I know that this is with thee. (Job 10:1-13 KJV)
Weariness and Refreshing (2)
OUTLINE
- Wont of Care (v1-7)
- Wont of Comfort (v8-13)
Continued…
(2)Wont of Comfort (v8-13)
8Thine hands have made me and fashioned me together round about; yet thou dost destroy me.
As we hear this utterance of Job in verse 8, let us be reminded the word of God to Satan – Job 2:3 And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil? and still he holdeth fast his integrity, although thou movedst me against him, to destroy him without cause.
It was Satan who moved the Lord against Job to destroy him without cause. To Job, he understood that he was “fearfully and wonderfully” made by his Creator God. God has fashioned him as his servant “in His mould”. That fashioning involves persecution and suffering for His Name’s sake. Job couldn’t not see the higher purpose of God in his suffering in that the cause of his affliction was hidden from him.
In this state of affliction, he was wont of comfort. Mentally, he was struggling to understand his predicament. Physically, his pain has become unbearable. This is the long and short of a spiritual trial.
Our Lord Jesus was tempted by Satan after he was an hungred 40 days and 40 nights.
Matthew 4:1-11 Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down:for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him,All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
1 John 2:16-17 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
- Expect Temptation in Life (v1-3a)
- Expect Victory in Jesus Christ (v3b-11)
Even our Lord Himself was tempted, “For the disciple is not greater than his Master, nor the servant his Lord.” All men are subject to temptation, and let us not no discouraged by them: for even Christ our Lord was tempted and that to the end that He might conquer Satan, that He might give us the victory over Him, and comfort us in all our temptation.
1 Peter 4:12 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you.
Jesus had just been baptized. It was a high point of His life, the beginning of His public ministry, after 30 years of living in obscurity, Jesus was publicly recognized as the Messiah. The parallel account in Luke’s Gospel in chapter 3 and verse 1 tells us that Jesus was full of the Holy Ghost when this trial came upon Him. Then what happened then came the tempter. Let us come to the story. It is interesting how Matthew uses the adverb “then” and the conjunction “and” to connect the narrative that it is a flowing story, the actions moving from scene to scene to describe the drama of human life.
1 Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.2And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. 3And when the tempter came to him…
Matthew 4:1 tells us that, “Jesus was led up of the Spirit in the wilderness.”
What is the wilderness? It is the desert place, hostile environment. Luke’s gospel tells us that He was with the wild beast. It was a life-threatening, harsh, difficult environment. A picture of human life and the vicissitudes of life (Latin vicis which means changedescribing changes of any kind in one’s life), the difficult times that we all go through: sickness, job loss, and other unwelcome episodes in life. No one can escape the vicissitudes of life. These are God’s appointed testing in life.
2And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.
Jesus had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, He upheld himself without meat or drink to show forth how His divine power is able to sustain His people under every burden the Father should lay upon Him. The fasting is a description of the limits to human endurance. Jesus endured the most rigors and then…
Coming back to Matthew 4:1 again, “Jesus was led up of the Spirit in the wilderness.”
Who did the leading? The Holy Spirit! Who did the tempting? The devil. And observe the name that is used to describe the tempter – He is called the devil in verse 1, 5, 8, 11 to describe his nature, it is Greek word “diabolos”, it comes from the verb “to defame, slander, accuse falsely”. Each time he would cast doubt upon Christ’s Deity that indeed Jesus is God, “if you are God”, then do this and this and this!
This is he that vexed Job. You know that the book of Job was the earliest book of the Bible. And right at the beginning, the devil was there with his cunning, devious schemes. The bible calls his devious schemes “the wiles of the devil”. The bible calls him a murderer, a liar and a roaring lion.
John 8:44Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
1 Peter 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:
“Diabolos” is the usual Greek rendering of the Hebrew word “Satan” in the OT. And so, in the Job 1, you see Satan there, word appearing 14 times, the superhuman adversary, the fallen angel that is cast down from heaven, whom God gave permission to test Job if he will renounce God when things dear to him are being taken away from him like his children, his wealth, his health.
The role of the devil is to separate God’s people from God. When not actively accusing the saints, he roams the earth collecting evidence for his next prosecution.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if God would save us then take us up to glory, wouldn’t it be a great relief. We would never have any temptations. We would never to battle with the flesh. But God, in His infinite wisdom, has deliberately left us this earth. And He has sovereignly given us years of life in Christ than out of Christ to live for Him – Philippians 2:15 That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.
The Lord has made no mistake leaving us here on purpose for His purpose as living examples, strong testimonies of the right way. We are a spiritual salmon swimming upstream! Temptation is not sin but it is a call to battle. There is no way to fault a Christian except when he willing consent to fall from the path of righteousness.
Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.
Jesus was tired, hungry, physically very weak, without food and water for 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness, weakest point physically, a most trying time – solitary, desolate, lonely. This made him all the more vulnerable to the devil’s attack, humanly speaking.
Dear brethren, it may be a sickness that weakened your body, where you may not be able to come to worship with the company of saints. You feel lonely at home, perhaps you in the hospital. You are tempted to become discouraged and depressed. If you look at life, any trial can become a temptation if we give in to our anger, if we lose our temper, break our promises, compromise the truth, if we trade in our integrity, if we hide like cowards instead of standing up for what we believe. You could observe in life that the same event will often be both a temptation and a trial.
Why did Jesus have to go through this time of temptation or testing? He had to go through this time of testing because He had to earn the righteousness we need to enter the kingdom of heaven. It is part of His active obedience.
Even our Lord Himself was tempted, “For the disciple is not greater than his Master, nor the servant his Lord.” We are to expect temptation.
Expect Victory in Jesus Christ (v3b-11)
The reason why we preach this message is so that you may have victory over temptation. We all know that temptation is a very common problem for all of us, but victory over temptation is not so common. Why is that so? Have you ever wondered this question? I submit to you that it is because you have not been spending time with Jesus! You have not been looking to Jesus but have been looking at your temptation in the eye and have been caught in a seemingly inescapable net.
Remember our memory verse Hebrews 2:18 –
18 For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour (to come to the aid of, to help, to rescue) them that are tempted.
And we see in the preceding verse:
Hebrews 2:17 Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto hisbrethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertainingto God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.
Why did Jesus go through this episode here in Matt. 4, He did it so that He could become a merciful and faithful high priest who could sympathize with our weaknesses and Who could come to the aid of those who are tempted.
The context shows our Lord suffered suffering the temptation, but He was not drawn away to sin, so that believers have the sympathy of Christ as their High Priest in the suffering through temptation to enjoy the communion with God through Christ in prayer.
Hebrews 4:15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yetwithout sin.
In all the temptations Christ endured, there was nothing there was no sin in Him. While He was truly man, and His divine nature was not in any way inconsistent with His Manhood, there as nothing in Him such as is produced in us by the sinful nature which belongs to us.
This is the Saviour, our perfect Saviour, our Satan-Conquerer, our Sympathizer.
This is what I would like to bring to you as we go into the detail of His encounter with the tempter. Three times the tempter confronted him and three times He defeated him.
Spurgeon said well, “We should never have such fellowship with Jesus as we do if we had not such troubles as we have. We cannot see the stars in the daytime, but they tell us that if we go down into a well we can. Sometimes God sinks wells of trouble and puts his servants into them and then they see his starry promises.”
Job looked forward in time to the Redeemer to succor him in his trial.
9Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay; and wilt thou bring me into dust again?
This was Job’s plea to God, his prayer for God to vindicate and help him.
46How long, LORD? wilt thou hide thyself for ever? shall thy wrath burn like fire? 47Remember how short my time is: wherefore hast thou made all men in vain? 48What man is he that liveth, and shall not see death? shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave? Selah. 49Lord, where are thy former lovingkindnesses, which thou swarest unto David in thy truth? 50Remember, Lord, the reproach of thy servants; how I do bear in my bosom the reproach of all the mighty people; 51Wherewith thine enemies have reproached, O LORD; wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of thine anointed. 52Blessed be the LORD for evermore. Amen, and Amen. (Ps. 89:46-52 KJV)
Man’s extremity is God’s opportunity to demonstrate His faithfulness. The night is darkest just before the dawn. When we are ready to hit rock bottom, God will be there to meet us. Will God not have favour on His people again? Certainly He will.
The late pastor Rogers made asked this question: You can tell a lot about a person by what makes him sad, what makes him glad and what makes him made.
However, when a person has joy in the Lord, nothing can steal that joy. Have you learned to have joy in the Lord and not in the things of this world? Are you holding the things of this world loosely? If you don’t, then God may teach you to do this. To fully trust God in the Lord, there must be a confidence that relies on the Lord. Secondly, there must be a communion that rejoices in the Lord. And thirdly, there must be a commitment that rolls burdens onto the Lord.
10Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese? 11Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews.
Thus, he modestly and accurately describes God’s admirable work in making man out of a small and liquid, and as it were milky, substance, by degrees congealed and condensed into that exquisite frame of man’s body.
Clothed me,i.e. covered my inward and more noble parts; which, as philosophers and physicians observe, are first formed. So, he proceeds in describing man’s formation gradually.
With bones and sinews;which are the stay and strength of the body; and some of them, as the skull and ribs, enclose and defend its vital and most noble parts. [Poole]
12Thou hast granted me life and favour, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit. 13And these things hast thou hid in thine heart: I know that this is with thee.
Thou madest me, and knowest my strength; wilt thou then suffer me to be pressed above measure? Was I made to be made miserable? Was I preserved only to be reserved for these calamities?”
If we plead this with ourselves as an inducement to duty, “God made me and maintains me, and therefore I will serve him and submit to him,” we may plead it with God as an argument for mercy: Thou hast made me,new–make me; I am thine, save me.Job knew not how to reconcile God’s former favours and his present frowns, but concludes (v13), “These things hast thou hidden in thy heart.Both are according to the counsel of thy own will, and therefore undoubtedly consistent, however they seem.”
When God thus strangely changes His way, though we cannot account for it, we are bound to believe there are good reasons for it hidden in his heart, which will be manifested shortly. It is not with us, or in our reach, to assign the cause, but I know that this is with thee.Known unto God are all his works. [Matthew Henry]
CONCLUSION
May the Lord grant us strength to submit to Him in woe and in weal. Amen.